1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to on-line conversations, and more particularly, to multilingual on-line conversations.
2. Description of the Related Art
Many on-line service providers, such as Apple's world and various Internet service providers, allow users or subscribers to converse in real time using text Such conversations are held in "chat rooms." Users are able to log into and out of a chat room as they like. To enter a particular chat room, the user's computer electronically connects to an on-line service provider's host computer which provides the chat service. Once connected, the user is able to enter (i.e., log into) any of a number of chat rooms being supported by the chat service. Those users logged into a chat room are able to see any message typed and sent by any of the other members logged into the chat room. The on-line services also offer the ability to send real-time messages in a one-on-one mode, where a message is targeted to a specific user who is currently on-line.
One significant problem with existing on-line chat services is that all participants to a conversation (within a chat room) must share a common language. The common language is customarily English in as much as most people involved with computers have at least a minimum fluency in English. However, since these on-line services are available on a global basis, non-English speaking people are at a distinct disadvantage when using on-line chat services. Although conversations in other specific languages can be initiated, the problem remains that those who are not sufficiently fluent to converse in that language are placed at a disadvantage.
Although computer-based translation of documents and files is available today to convert such documents and files from one language to another language. However, such computer-based translation is unsuitable for on-line chat services or message-based conversations which do not involve documents or files.
Hence, there is a need to provide on-line services such that international, real-time, text-based conversations can be had between two or more users who themselves use different languages to converse.